Emmett, not to hijack your thread do you know Bob Wisdom @ East of Sweden in Broomfield, CO. He is a SAAB guy and a customer of mine.

 

I've heard of that Saab garage but I'm UK based so don't deal with him.




So anyway, there we go, look at that little rotter:







The replacement valve looked like this one:







They're not very hard to get to and they're not expensive so would recommend people check them if the engine isn't running too well. In this case it was poor idle speed, smoking due to overfuelling or incomplete combustion. Stalling and very difficult to drive. Revved ok once past around 2500rpm - presumably because at that engine speed the Vanos adjustment was better suited.

 

Emmett. I am going out on a limb here.... but did this happen after an oil change? The wrong oil viscosity can cause an engine to sputter really bad and not leave any significant Check engine codes except for knocks.

I had a 1.8T in an A4 engine once that a customer flat bedded into us because it started with a crappy idle on start up, so bad that it would stall out on us. We checked everything, replaced spark plugs, wires, coils. Checked compression and injectors. In the end we found out it happened after an oil change. We put the factory specified oil type in and all was well with the world.

Again, going out on a limb...

 

I'd say this car was dealer serviced going by what the customer told me.


I agree with your theory though. The failed part does look blocked.

 

Well, the customer told us the same thing. Actually it was our Master "Super Master" Porsche/Audi/BMW Manager - Former tech who pointed us in the right direction after all of the "Formal" diagnostic procedures had been followed. It was his experience that told us to change the oil. We all kind of laughed, but hell we were were so baffled we were grasping at straws and an oil change was a cheap and easy fix so we tried it. It surprised us when it worked.

Again, just going out on a limb. Different cars, different engines, but same principles.

 

It can make a MINI quieter sometimes. Bad or low oil stops the tensioner working as well as it should and the chain starts to rattle.

 

Similarly with other cars but different parts and different sorts of noises. Hydraulic tappets for example.

 

How long does it take to check these? Do you have to pull the front cover at all?

 

It's mounted on the rear of the cylinder head just next to the timing chain tensioner. I took off the inlet manifold to make access easier but if you don't mind a struggle (something I'm not keen on) you could probably scrape a few knuckles and get it out with the manifold in place. So the answer to your question is that it depends on how long it takes you to strip off the relevant parts to get to the solenoid. It's near the top of the engine so not the most inaccessible part.

 

That doesn't sound too bad. I'm super OCD when it comes to cleaning my intake valves, so I've gotten pretty good at taking my intake manifold off. I'll take a look at it the next time I take it off. Thanks

 

I think it might have been possible to clean the one I had but when it's a customers car they want it done right first time. It also wasn't a very expensive part so made sense to change it. But if you were doing 'port maintenance' it wouldn't take much additional effort to take out the solenoid and soak it in a degreaser solution for an hour to keep it clean inside.

 

Sounds like something I will be doing during my next walnut shell blasting, which will be happening this spring

 

I have seen the same buildup on Honda VTECH solenoid screens actually cause a no-start situation. Happens when oil changes are neglected for far too long. Once again, folks, frequent oil and filter changes can indeed be cheap insurance. Unless those are metal flakes....then, your customer's situation may be more dire.